Product Description

A bestselling master of historical fiction, James Alexander Thom has brought unforgettable Native American figures to life for millions of readers, powerfully dramatizing their fortitude, fearsomeness, and profound fates. Now he and his wife, Dark Rain, have created a magnificent portrait of an astonishing woman–one who led her people in war when she could not persuade them to make peace.

Her name was Nonhelema. Literate, lovely, imposing at over six feet tall, she was the Women’s Peace Chief of the Shawnee Nation–and already a legend when the most decisive decade of her life began in 1774. That fall, with more than three thousand Virginians poised to march into the Shawnees’ home, Nonhelema’s plea for peace was denied. So she loyally became a fighter, riding into battle covered in war paint. When the Indians ran low on ammunition, Nonhelema’s role changed back to peacemaker, this time tragically.

Negotiating an armistice with military leaders of the American Revolution like Daniel Boone and George Rogers Clark, she found herself estranged from her own people–and betrayed by her white adversaries, who would murder her loved ones and eventually maim Nonhelema herself.

Throughout her inspiring life, she had many deep and complex relationships, including with her daughter, Fani, who was an adopted white captive . . . a pious and judgmental missionary, Zeisberger . . . a series of passionate lovers . . . and, in a stunning creation of the Thoms, Justin Case–a cowardly soldier transformed by the courage he saw in the female Indian leader.

Filled with the uncanny period detail and richly rendered drama that are Thom trademarks, Warrior Woman is a memorable novel of a remarkable person–one willing to fight to avoid war, by turns tough and tender, whose heart was too big for the world she wished to tame.


From the Hardcover edition.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #110976 in Books
• Published on: 2004-11-23
• Released on: 2004-11-23
• Original language: English
• Dimensions: 6.88" h x 1.06" w x 4.18" l, .56 pounds
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• 512 pages

From Publishers Weekly
In 1774, on the eve of the American Revolution, a female Shawnee warrior chief preached peace to her angry tribe, whose homeland on the banks of the Ohio river was threatened by the Virginia army. In this dense, moving fictional account of 12 critical years in Shawnee history, veteran historical novelist Thom (Sign-Talker, etc.) and his Shawnee wife tell the story of a remarkable woman who led her people's doomed resistance against her better judgment. Nonhelema, whose name means "Not a Man," and who was called the "Grenadier Squaw" by the British for her height and bearing, witnessed white aggression and treachery on a daunting, even revolting scale. (Perhaps the worst was a massacre of "Praying Indians" of the Delaware tribe.) Nevertheless, she converted to Christianity and was slow to dismiss all whites, two of whom (George Morgan and Alexander McKee) were her lovers and fathers of her children. Her faith in a peaceful solution is sorely tested by the galling settlement the Shawnee are forced to accept after their defeat in 1774, but worse is yet to come. The story is slow-moving and rather disjointed, and there are some anachronistic asides-one character coins the term "herstory"-but impressive research and well-rounded characters give the novel force and breadth. Nonhelema, a nuanced creation herself, is surrounded by intriguing secondary figures like Fani, her adopted white daughter; Brother Zeisberger, a manipulative missionary; and Justin Case, a cowardly soldier inspired to greatness by Nonhelema.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
In this prequel to his stirring 1989 novel of Tecumseh, Panther in the Sky, Thom joins with his wife, Dark Rain, in writing an enlightening saga of the lesser-known Shawnee Indian chief, Nonhelema. In 1774, Nonhelema and her brother are trying to convince their tribe to make peace with the Virginians, who are threatening Shawnee villages. The tribe votes instead for war--the first of many decisions separating Nonhelema, a convert to Christianity, from her people. Nonhelema's skill as an interpreter proves valuable to white generals marching through Shawnee territory, but she is unwittingly used by them to provide information about tribal movement and battle capability. Shunned because of her support of the Americans against the British and her bias toward peace, and betrayed by every white man she had trusted, Nonhelema is eventually forced to leave her homeland. Drawing on the writings of Justin Case, an early nineteenth-century officer and physician, the Thoms have vibrantly enriched the chief's story, keeping alive a remarkable figure from a painful period in American history. Deborah Donovan
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review
Praise for James Alexander Thom
and Sign-Talker

“Very readable, fresh, original, and vivid.”
–LARRY MCMURTRY

“James Alexander Thom is one of the finest historical novelists writing today. He knows how to tell a cracking good yearn, cares passionately about getting his history right, and has a gift for illuminating those forgotten but fascinating corners of the American past with sheer storytelling power.”
–JOHN SUGDEN
Author of Tecumseh: A Life

“Excellent . . . It is at once an adventure story [and] a historical document . . . Even though many readers know the story of Lewis and Clark, Thom’s novel will give them new insight.”
–The Indianapolis Star (4-star review)

“The majesty of the scenery, the wonder of the stately tribes who greet, and menace, the expedition and the expedition’s mix of soldiers, ne’er-do-wells, and French traders all combine to produce a strong novel about the days when Missouri was at the edge of the map.”
–The Kansas City Star

“This great journey halfway across a wilderness continent and back has never been told so compellingly, with so much dignity and wisdom, as in Sign-Talker.”
–SCOTT RUSSELL SANDERS
Author of Hunting for Hope


From the Hardcover edition.